Gathering to give thanks

Journal-Advocate staff

Posted:
11/21/2012 11:06:19 AM MST

Ah, Thanksgiving. The day when the vast majority of us will gather with family and friends to consume massive amounts of turkey, stuffing, pie and other favorite dishes as a recognition of the bounty we are blessed to have.

In addition to the food, there are some other common traditions. Many will tune in to watch the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade and welcome in the Christmas season as Santa rides his sleigh down the route. Some will team up for a friendly game of backyard football; others will just enjoy watching the professionals play from their post-feast stupor on the couch. Some will spend time researching the best deals and planning their strategy for Black Friday (which starts Thursday in some stores!) shopping sprees. Hopefully, all will take a little time to count their blessings.

Regardless of our situation, we all have reasons to give thanks. Consider the original thanks-givers: the Pilgrims who had faced a long, hard year of surviving and adapting to life in a new, wildly foreign land. They gave thanks for freedom from tyranny and religious persecution. They gave thanks for their new native friends who taught them how to grow corn. Even after losing so many of their fellow settlers, they gave thanks for survival.

We are blessed to have come so far from that first Thanksgiving. Most of us don't need to wonder where our next meal will come from: Food to please all palates is available at our local grocery store. Thanks to our agricultural producers for that.

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Medical advances have extended our life spans significantly, all but wiping out many diseases that brought our forefathers low in generations past, and helping us survive conditions that would have once been an automatic death sentence. Thanks to all those in the health care profession and related fields, many of whom will sacrifice their own holiday to serve those in need of care. We live in a nation where our personal freedoms are guaranteed and enshrined in the Constitution. For that we can thank our Founding Fathers, and also those brave, pioneering souls who ventured into this strange land we now call home in search of a place where they could live their lives the way they saw fit.

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